Connecticut's Most Famous Nolle
| Jurisdiction | Connecticut,United States |
| Publication year | 2021 |
| Citation | Vol. 68 Pg. 443 |
| Pages | 443 |
68 CBJ 443. Connecticut's Most Famous Nolle
Picture this:
The year is 1924, a time when murder in Connecticut is a rarity, each one meriting front-page news. In the entire year, only one murder case will reach Connecticut's highest court-then known as the Supreme Court of Errors (fn1) At 7:45 on a winter evening, just five minutes after the famed actress Ethel Barrymore enters Bridgeport's New Lyric Theater to perform the lead in "The Laughing Lady," (fn2) one of Bridgeport's most beloved clerics is gunned down on the sidewalk across from the theater. Dead is the Rev. Hubert Dahme, pastor of St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Church. The scene is downtown Bridgeport, a bustling place, ordinarily safe from serious crime (even at night), with restaurants and palatial theaters.
Within hours, every available Bridgeport policeman is searching for clues. Within days, rewards are being offered by the authorities and a Bridgeport daily newspaper. By the time of the priest's funeral, five days after the murder, twelve thousand people-under the watchful eye of plainclothesmen on the alert for a betraying sign-pass by the casket as the body lay in state. Newspapers and the public are becoming indignant over the lack of a solution to the murder.
Within eight days, a transient, indigent World War I veteran named Harold Israel, on his way to Pennsylvania after having lived for a brief period of time in Bridgeport, is arrested in nearby Norwalk. He has in his possession a .32 caliber revolver with all but one of the five chambers empty.
Three days after the arrest, the indigent is bound over to the Superior Court on a City Court finding that probable cause exists to charge him with the murder of the priest. And ten days
later, the Fairfield County coroner makes a determination of the cause of death and files a detailed ten-point finding concluding that the indigent caused the death of Father Dahme. The coroner bases his conclusion on the following points:
First. The accused was seen by an acquaintance, Tellie Trafton, within a block of the place of the shooting five to ten minutes before the shooting.
Second. The slayer wore a gray cap and a brown overcoat, the latter having a black velvet collar.
Third. Witnesses Frederick W. Morris and Ralph Esposito saw a man wearing a gray cap and overcoat shoot the deceased and run westerly up High Street.
Fourth. Witnesses Jennie Boynton and Hilda Baer, eastbound on High Street, heard the fatal shot and saw the fleeing slayer cross High Street about one hundred feet west of Main Street. Both witnesses claimed the slayer wore a gray cap and brown overcoat, and Ms. Baer additionally noted the overcoat had a velvet collar.
Fifth. Ten minutes after the shooting, witness Edward Flood saw a man wearing a gray cap and dark overcoat running at the junction of Washington Avenue, Congress Street and Harrison Street. According to Mr. Flood, the man appeared exhausted and stubbed his toe on the curb before continuing his journey west on Washington Avenue.
Sixth. Witnesses Esposito, Boynton, Baer and Flood identified the accused at police headquarters as the person they had seen fleeing from the scene of the shooting.
Seventh. The accused made a statement in writing admitting the crime.
Eighth. The accused, accompanied by members of the police department, went over the course of his flight and designated the various spots referred to above.
Ninth. The accused informed the police of the location of an empty shell of a bullet. It was subsequently found by the police at the specified location.
Tenth. The revolver found on the accused was a .32 caliber of Spanish manufacture, and it was the gun from which the bullet found in the head of the deceased was discharged.
It was against this background that seventy years ago last May, a part-time Fairfield County State's Attorney stood before the Superior Court and explained that-notwithstanding the above-he was exercising his discretion as State's Attorney to enter a nolle prosequi. (fn3) This was undoubtedly Connecticut's most memorable nolle. That part-time Fairfield County State's Attorney was Homer Stille Cummings, founder of one of Connecticut's largest and most prestigious law firms (fn4) and later Attorney General of the United States. The explanation he gave was delivered verbally without a written note, lasted one and a half hours, and filled twenty-six printed pages. It came in the wake of community anger and frustration over the murder of a beloved, well-known and influential cleric who had many friends and few, if any, known enemies.
On May 27, 1924, in the Golden Hill courthouse in Bridgeport-then the only regular Superior Court in Fairfield County-State's Attorney Cummings entered that nolle which terminated the case of State of Connecticut v. Harold Israel. Mr. Cummings told Superior Court Judge L. P. Waldo Marvin in announcing the nolle:
The case against the accused seemed overwhelming. Upon its face, at least, it seemed like a well-nigh perfect case, affording but very little difficulty in the matter of successful prosecution. In fact, if Your Honor please, it seemed like an "annihilating" case. There did not seem to be a vestige of reason for suspecting for a moment that the accused was innocent. The evidence had been described by those who
believed in the guilt of the accused as "100 percent perfect." (fn5) But, the State's Attorney pointed out, there were many people " without any particular assignable reason" who were doubtful. It was highly important, therefore, that every fact should be scrutinized with the "utmost care." Mr. Cummings gave no amplification of what prompted the doubt. Writing about the case 17 years later, famed Admiral Richard E. Byrd noted:
Any person's guess is as good as mine as to what it was that gave Mr. Cummings the hunch that aroused his suspicions. He himself says he doesn't know. (fn6)
By "utmost care," Mr. Cummings meant interviewing, personally, every person of consequence who had anything to say for or against the accused, studying the thousands of pages of accumulated transcript, interviewing the accused in the presence of his public defender, and consulting a host of experts. He located himself in the same place as the witnesses who identified the escaping criminal, under conditions as nearly as possible like those which existed on the night in question. He explained that it was tedious and exacting research and that he reached a definitive conclusion about the innocence of the accused. As to each of the points relied upon by the coroner, the State's Attorney responded in detail.
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As to the testimony of the accuseds acquaintance, Nellie Trafton, a waitress who said she noticed Israel pass her restaurant at 7:35 p.m. and waved to him in response to his wave to her: Trafton's testimony was important because the defendant claimed he entered a movie theater at seven o'clock and left shortly after nine. If Trafton were correct, Israel's false alibi would tend to establish his guilt. The State's Attorney, his caution alerted because Ms. Trafton was a reward seeker, realized upon personal examination that it would be difficult for her, inside the...
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